Who Is Like Dean
by Somilge
Summary: Dean Winchester. Hunter, pie aficionado, true vessel to Michael (not that he was too keen about it) and now apparently wrangler of holy weaponry. Cas so owed him for this. Sequel (of sorts) to The Voice of Shawn.
1. Chapter 1

**Who Is Like Dean**

Dean Winchester. Hunter, pie aficionado, true vessel to Michael (not that he was too keen about it) and now apparently wrangler of holy weaponry. Cas so owed him for this.

To be absolutely honest, this story has been in the making for about two years. I really never planned for a sequel (of sorts) to 'The Voice of Shawn', but when an idea nags at you for that length of time it's almost compulsory to see it through. I've had the entire thing mapped out, it's just been an issue of typing it all down, but I'm determined to do it. I hope to have a chapter up per week in the very least.

This time the story is completely Dean-centric and set between Supernatural Ep06.09 'Clap Your Hands if You Believe' and Ep06.10 'Caged Heat', mostly because Soulless!Sam can be a scream to write, and in the Psych-verse a little after Ep06.01 'Shawn Rescues Darth Vader'. I'm throwing in two more shows in this crossover this time, which I'll reveal as the story goes along. While in TVoS I used both actual and Supernatural lore, I found that for the subject matter of this story I needed to make up a lot of my own, especially concerning the holy weapons. If I mention anything that contradicts Supernatural lore, please let me know and I'll fix it up as best as I can.

Uh, well, except for one thing – as this continues from TVoS my Metatron is different. A lot different. I will reference the prequel a quite a lot so it would help to have read it before this. Story is rated T for the Winchesters' potty mouths. I own nothing recognizable. And with all that out of the way, I give you Who Is Like Dean.

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Chapter 01

_In which our hero wants to kick his holy Cas where the sun don't shine_

Dean Winchester had problems. This in itself wasn't new – Dean had been having very unusual, specifically supernatural problems since he was four years old. As of the moment, however, he felt like those problems had manifested into figurative shit that was raining down at him from all angles.

Opposite from him Sam gave him a blank stare. "Why do I have to care about upsetting that old bat? She should be thankful instead of angry – I purged her house of that stupid poltergeist."

"Yeah, by setting fire to her prize-winning garden. And then salting the earth so that nothing would ever grow again."

"It was her goddamn fault for fertilizing the soil with her cremated husband's fucking ash."

Dean sighed. Soulless!Sam was his primary problem. While his brother's normal, empathetic self had sometimes gotten on Dean's nerves, he found that this Sam, minus the warm and fluffy, was even more annoying. He was almost starting to miss the puppy dog eyes. Sam still did the bitch-face (which Dean didn't miss so much) pretty well though, soul or no soul.

Problem two was Crowley. The thought that he and Sam had to work for that demonic scumbag under a technicality made Dean feel unbelievably dirty. And not the good dirty. It was the disgusting, mind rapey dirty that extended to feeling actually physically violated. Every time Dean thought about it too hard he had to resist the urge to throw up in his mouth a little. They needed to find a way out of Crowley's well-manicured thumb and soon.

And problem number three concerned an angel. 'Your angel', as the all new douchebag Sam liked to say. Castiel was in the process of fighting a civil war in Heaven, as he liked to constantly remind the brothers every time they called on him for help. Although Dean didn't have the foggiest idea what that entailed (although the literal image of 'feathers will fly' did come to mind), he at least acknowledged that it was a big deal. Still he usually acted nonplussed about it, but in reality he was concerned, mostly about Cas, not that he would ever say it out loud. Especially with douchebag Sam around.

Dean figured he should tackle one problem at a time, and since a heavenly bust up wasn't something he had a whole lot of control over, he would start with the problem he could face. Or, rather, the problem that was facing him right now, complete with big, petulant bitch-face.

"Sam, I thought we agreed on this? From now on you follow my lead. And, for further reference, if you're unsure what that lead is, particularly when dealing with civilians, think of the least asshole-ish thing you can think of and act on that. Got it?"

"You make a lousy conscience, you know that?"

"Considering I never had to be one before, I'd say I'm doing an okay job!" Dean countered.

Sam rolled his eyes and looked like he was going to say something (which was probably some remark about Dean being a wussy), when he looked up and instead informed, "Oh look, your angel is here."

Surprised, Dean turned around. True enough Castiel stood in the middle of their motel room, trench coat, somber look and all. "Hello number three," Dean murmured absently.

Castiel gave him a confused look. "Number three?"

"It's nothing," Dean said, shaking his head. "What's up, Cas? If this is about another missing weapon it'll kind of have to go on the back burner. Me and Ragdoll(i) here are trying to hash something out."

"This cannot wait," Castiel said, looking almost uncharacteristically skittish. "I need to ask you for a favor."

Dean sighed. After having to put up with Sam and other people's understandably belligerent reactions to him, all he wanted was to drill a few things into his brother's thick skull and then drop into bed for some sleep. Still, this was Cas – he could at least hear the guy out. "All right, what is it?"

"I need you to retrieve all the weapons that Balthazar has moved," Castiel said.

Both Dean and Sam blinked quizzically at him. "Uh, aren't we already doing that?" Sam wondered.

"To a point – you stumble upon something that could be a relic and then investigate it," Castiel said. "Now I need you to switch tactics and actively pursue these weapons."

"Any reason for the switch from 'at your pace' to freakin' 'URGENT'?" Dean asked.

Castiel paced – he actually PACED. Dean noted that even Sam looked vaguely perturbed at that. "It's come to our attention that Raphael and his followers have put the recovery of the holy weapons as their primary focus. If Raphael comes into possession of them there is no question about who will win this war. I cannot let that happen, Dean."

"Wait a minute, I thought you had someone tracking down Balthazar?"

"Unfortunately cornering him has proven to be… tricky."

Sam frowned. "Well if you hadn't insisted on letting Liberace go in the first place…"

"He is a brother to whom I owe my life to – I was honor-bound," Castiel defended.

"You know, it's that exact sentimentality that's going to get your feathers plucked in this war," Sam said to him.

Dean saw Castiel bristle the slightest bit, and so he stepped in between the two of them. "Sam, what did I say about being an asshole?"

"That it's normally your job?"

"Damn straight," Dean said. He liked being peacemaker about as much as he liked being a conscience. "But not that one, the other thing."

"That I should, at all times, refrain from being one," Sam parroted with a sigh.

Dean nodded wearily, but also mumbled something about talking to a rock-filled sack that made Sam glare at him. He turned to Castiel now and said, "Do you even know how many of these weapons Balthazar has sold off to unsuspecting people?"

Castiel looked mournful.

"An approximate number? No?"

Castiel shook his head.

"Well can you at least point us to a possible location? Any place on the map that we can drive to that has even the slightest bit of indication that something not normal is going down?"

"Not at the moment, no."

Dean gave a frustrated groan. "You've got to give us something to go on, Cas!"

"I'm sorry I cannot impart more information."

"Any information, more like," Sam muttered.

Castiel looked like he chose to ignore that. "But Dean, please, I am asking for your help."

Dean sighed. Between Crowley demanding their assistance and Castiel asking for it, he was starting to feel less like a hunter and more like an errand boy. Of course it was obvious what the (much) lesser of the two evils was, and so he nodded. "All right, Cas, we'll help." He held up a hand before Sam could say anything. "We'll help."

"Thank you," Castiel said, looking relieved. "I'll be in touch." And with a rustle of feathers he was gone.

Sam lifted a hand to where Castiel had stood and gave Dean an incredulous look.

"Don't give me that look, Sam," Dean said, waving his hand. "Cas has always been there for us – it's only fair we return the favor."

"Actually Cas has always been there for YOU."

"And by extension, you," Dean countered. He rubbed his hands. "So, time to get tracking. Delegation – you start researching on any and all disturbances within the tri-state area… and possibly way beyond. Electrical storms, pillars of salt, decapitations, reanimated zombified remains, random smitings, anything even remotely suspicious."

"Right, and what are you going to do?"

Dean responded by dropping into his bed, stretching out into a more comfortable position and closing his eyes.

"Really, Dean? You're just going to go to sleep on me? Dude, we just fire-bombed a vegetable garden – aren't you going to even take a shower or something?"

Dean responded to that by flashing him the finger.

Sam narrowed his eyes but went to go set up his laptop. Sometimes Dean liked to use that whole not sleeping thing of Sam's way too much to his advantage.

Continued

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i _Secret Six_ comic book character with no soul.


	2. Chapter 2

I just noticed that the lengths of each chapter in this story tend to be erratic; some are short, others really long. This is one of the former. A lot of the chapters are of the characters talking. However the story is moving, slowly, but moving. Thank you to those who have read and reviewed!

* * *

Chapter 02

_In which Agent Osterberg and Detective Dorsey make a meeting_

Dean roused himself out of slumber a few hours later, mostly by shifting the wrong way and poking himself with the knife he customarily kept under his pillow. He let out an annoyed grunt, cracked open an eye and rolled over, blinking sleepily.

"Did you poke yourself again?" Sam asked, not looking up from where he was still scrolling through his laptop.

"No," Dean lied.

"You know once or twice is understandable, but when you've done it fifty-seven times don't you think you should have learned your lesson by now?"

"Shaddup," Dean said, sitting up and rubbing his face. "So, what have you got?"

"Well there was an event in Des Moines where several people with no relation to each other reported seeing the face of Jesus Christ in the clouds," Sam began. "And then two days ago in Wichita thirteen tombstones in the Maple Grove Cemetery suddenly faced east instead of north – considering it happened overnight nobody thinks it was a mere prank. And in Georgia…"

He was interrupted when Dean's phone rang. Dean yawned, motioned to Sam to give him a minute, and then answered it. "This is Agent Osterberg(i)."

"Agent Osterberg, this is Detective Arnold Dorsey," a familiar voice said on the other end.

"Shawn?" Dean said, raising an eyebrow.

"Oh come on, Dean, I was trying out a fake identity. What, you and Sam are the only ones allowed to impersonate persons of authority using rock star aliases? I believe it's called a 'synonym'."

"That's 'pseudonym', Shawn," Gus' voice said in the background.

"I've heard it both ways," Shawn answered him.

Dean had to grin. "Yeah, but did you have to use the real name of Engelbert Humperdinck?"

"You know the real name of Engelbert Humperdinck?" Sam said dryly, looking up from the screen.

"Shaddup," Dean told him again, and turned back to his phone. "Shawn, you do realize that I gave you this number for emergencies, right?"

"Dean, please, of course I know that."

"Really? Because the last time you called you wanted to know if I could confirm whether Ann Coulter was possessed by a demon or not."

"You've seen the woman – it was a fair question," Shawn defended. "But as to why I called now, well, Gus and I were thinking about renting a boat for the weekend and thought that if you and Sam were in the vicinity that maybe you wanted to join and…"

"Pass. Why'd you really call?"

Shawn chuckled, indicating that Dean was right and this time Shawn just wasn't calling for kicks. "Hah, you got me. Listen, I called because there's something a little suspicious going on here. You know, the 'holy shit, that can't be real, Christo, Christo save me' type of suspicious."

"Oh yeah?" Dean said, arching an eyebrow. "What exactly is going on?"

"It's… you know what, it would be better if I actually showed you," Shawn said. "Any chance you and your little big bro can swing by? I promise the pineapple smoothies are on Gus. Liberally doused with whiskey for you, of course."

Dean was hesitant. He liked Shawn, he did, despite the psychic detective being unpredictable, a loose cannon, and the poster child for acting on complete, batshit insane fucking impulse. In fact it could be argued that the above were the exact reasons why he liked him. And, even with the above, he was sure that Shawn wasn't one to see something that wasn't there. If he said it was the Winchesters' type of suspicious then there was 99.9% chance he was correct, and the 0.01% would be justified later. Still he wasn't sure if Shawn and his unusual method of tackling a situation was conducive to the situation he and his (very) detached brother were having at the moment…

"This pause has gone on for much longer than I'm comfortable with," Shawn said on the other end. "Dude, I have to tell you, if you start with the heavy breathing I might, well, I might suddenly consider things I shouldn't."

Dean must have given the phone a weird look because Sam asked, "Is he attempting phone sex or something?"

… Or it could be very, very funny. Besides, after hanging around Soulless!Sam, Shawn and Gus might actually be good for the two of them.

And so Dean made a snap decision. "Hey Sam, how much more of that research you did were you going to go through?"

"Uh, I had about forty possible hits," Sam said.

"Great, that settles it then," Dean said, and then to Shawn: "We'll be in Santa Barbara tomorrow morning."

"Awesome," Shawn said. "Gus is stoked – he's getting the smoothies as we speak. Until tomorrow, Agent Osterberg."

"Detective Dorsey."

"Actually I've decided it's now Detective Folasade Adu."

"Sade, Shawn?" Gus' voice came again.

"Yeah, I guess I'll keep working on that," Shawn said, and then ended the call.

Dean looked up to see that Sam was giving him an angry glare. "Six hours of research and you decide to skip off to Santa Barbara because Shawn called?"

"Hey, he said he had something suspicious that was right up our alley."

When Dean didn't elaborate, Sam prodded, "Well?"

"He said he'll show us when we get there."

The bitch-face was back in full effect at that. "So we're going there on the hunch of a guy who pretends to be a psychic detective."

"Hey, have a little faith, would you? Remember, it was the same fake psychic detective that saved your ass from Zachariah." Dean got to his feet and began to dump his stuff into his bag. "Now get packed up – I take the first driving shift."

Sam sighed. He was musing that even though he technically could feel no emotion, he was experiencing something vividly close to hate towards his older brother. And then he ultimately settled on indifference – he had been reverting to this trick throughout most of his interactions with his brother. He then remembered Shawn and Gus and wondered if the same tactic would work on them.

Continued

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i Stage name of Iggy Pop


	3. Chapter 3

Heh, I make a promise to update every week and promptly fail at it. Go me. Well, my horrific lack of self-discipline aside, I have got more than half of this story planned out, the problem is that I'm doing a lot more rewrites per chapter than I did for its prequel. I blame Shawn – he tends to run his mouth and just simply take over every scene he's in. I'm still working on it, however, so thanks to everyone reading!

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Chapter 03

_In which Shawn fails to make anyone believe that he is not suffering from acute jealousy_

At approximately ten in the morning on a clear day in Santa Barbara, the Impala pulled up next to the little blue Echo in the SBPD parking lot. Shawn and Gus stood on the sidewalk, waiting for them. The moment Dean and Sam stepped out, both in suits and ties, Shawn gave them a huge grin in greeting and said, "Agents! I haven't been this happy to see somebody since Shirley Tipper came back from camp with an impressive set of sweater yams."

"You know, people normally just say hi," Sam said to him.

"And since when does Shawn do anything normally?" Gus pointed out.

Shawn was too busy to take offense, having turned his attention to the Metallicar. "One of these days you're going to have to let me drive the Impala."

"Over my dead—actually, no, not even over my dead body," Dean said, refraining from saying his body probably won't stay cold and dead for long anyway. "Gus – I see you're still driving that tin can piece of garbage."

"Hey, I'll have you know that the Blueberry has seen its share of action – enough to take on your gas-guzzling monster any day," Gus countered.

"I may take you up on that," Dean said.

The four of them walked inside the SBPD, with Shawn casually asking Sam whether he had taken up bench pressing sofas along with hunting, and asking whether he could give his biceps a squeeze in a 'totally un-gay way'. Sam responded by flashing him a look of mild annoyance, but Dean had no doubt it wouldn't be long before Shawn got underneath his brother's skin enough for him to attempt actual bodily harm. While it would be funny, he would need to keep his eye out for it.

"So what exactly is this suspicious thing you called us here for?" Dean asked.

Shawn was about to answer when all of a sudden cheering and clapping could be heard by the desks. They headed over, whereupon Shawn got a disgusted look on his face and gestured to the celebration, saying, "THIS is the problem."

Apparently the problem was that the people in attendance, uniforms, detectives, the Chief herself, was congratulating a certain Detective Carlton Lassiter on his ninth straight successful arrest. Lassiter beamed proudly, sucking up the praise, saying something along the lines that it was a win for all of them. Sam looked at Dean, who raised an eyebrow, and in unison they turned withering stares on Shawn.

Shawn shook his head. "I know; it's APPALLING, isn't it?"

"This is your suspicious event?" Dean said.

"Yeah – nine absolutely perfect calls, nine straight arrests, nine cheers and hip-hip-hoorays for Lassie, and all of them done before I could even get on the scene? It's just not humanly possible. Well, not Lassie-possible."

"You called us here because this guy is on a lucky streak?" Dean said in an angrier tone, ignoring the I-told-you-so face that Sam was shooting him.

"This isn't a lucky streak, Dean!" Shawn insisted. "I know Lassie, and I know he isn't capable of something like this, sadly enough. It's got to be supernaturally-aided."

"Listen, Shawn, sometimes people just one-up you, okay?" Dean said impatiently. "Don't be such a fucking glory-hound and let the guy have his day."

"How dare you insinuate that this is a vanity thing," Shawn shot back. "I have never been envious of Lassie. Sure he might have a little height on me, but my hair more than makes up for it."

Gus rolled his eyes. "Shawn's neglected to say that this is Lassiter's ninth straight successful case in the past three days."

That made Dean and Sam pause and think. All of a sudden the lucky streak looked like it had been hooked up with performance enhancement drugs.

Shawn looked smug. "See? I meant it when I said it was suspicious. Lassie isn't capable of this. Hell, I'M not capable of this."

"In the future maybe you should lead on with that type of information," Sam said to him.

"That I'm not capable of this? Right, because that would be the most brilliant marketing strategy ever," Shawn said, rolling his eyes.

His own annoyance aside, Dean was happy to see that Sam was now aiming his patented bitch-face elsewhere.

"Now look, look, Lassie's coming over to gloat," Shawn said, pointing to where Lassiter had spotted them and started to come over with a barely contained smirk of triumph. He was stopped briefly when Juliet blocked him and the two of them began to have a hushed conversation. "And Jules, kind enough to spare my feelings, tries to keep him from doing so," Shawn said, whereupon he started to fill out the conversation for the both of them as they watched:

Shawn as Jules (sweet but firm and with a touch of condescension) – 'Carlton, please don't rub your questionable success in Shawn's beautiful face, or even his gorgeous, full-bodied hair that I want to run my fingers through all day.'

Shawn as Lassie (unnecessary gruff but also smug and douchey) – 'O'Hara, do you really think I'd be that petty? Yes, yes, I am that petty, considering that Spencer has shown me up more times than Guster has found and lost love.'

"Hey," Gus interjected, glaring at Shawn.

"Oh don't give me that look, Gus, you know it's true," Shawn said, and then returned to his fabricated conversation.

Shawn as Jules – 'You know this will only lead to him trying to one up you and then you trying to one up him, with him inevitably getting the best of you and sending you home to cry in a tub of Häagen-Dazs.'

Shawn as Lassie – 'I don't care, I'm going to have my moment, at least that brief, fleeting sense of triumph before Spencer makes some clever jape about my tie, my pants or my hair and I'll have nothing to answer him back with.'

Shawn as Jules – 'Because he's perfect?'

Shawn as Lassie – 'Because he's perfect.'

"Wow, that undefined narcissistic streak we got from you last time turned pretty definite pretty fast," Sam commented.

"How dare you – it was never undefined," Shawn said.

By that time Lassiter and Juliet had reached them. "Spencer, Guster, you're here, as always," Lassiter said, "And you've brought… Agents Mitchell and Redding, if I remember correctly?"

"Detective Lassiter," Dean greeted, quick to respond to the alias that he had used the last time they were in Santa Barbara. "Mr Spencer here contacted my partner and I regarding that cold case from 2004. Now it looks like it's just been solved."

"That's right; Detective Lassiter cracked the case early this morning when he came across buried evidence that had trace of the murderer's DNA. And now the suspect has been arrested," Juliet said, grinning widely. "I can't go too much into specifics, but it was incredible."

"So we've been hearing," Sam said, "You don't mind if we ask you a few questions about these recent cases, do you? Just for the sake of sating professional curiosity, of course."

"Not at all," Lassiter said magnanimously, "I will be happy to—"

"Right after he does an interview with the Santa Barbara Times," Juliet interjected quickly. "It was something Chief Vick arranged. She thought it would be good for the force's public image."

"Oh right, almost forgot about that," Lassiter said, snapping his fingers. "Well, Agents, maybe we can arrange for a meeting possibly later today? I would do it over lunch, but the mayor and his wife have invited me out so… anytime after that? I'm sure I can squeeze you in." He headed for the exit. "I'll see you later, O'Hara… Spencer, Guster." And then he strolled out.

Shawn flashed a disgusted look at the head detective's back and then turned back to his girlfriend, saying, "Jules, I am so sorry that you have to hang around that all day."

To his surprise, Juliet laughed. "I knew it, I told Carlton you would be so jealous. Really, Shawn, I know you're good, you've proved that, but it's good for morale to have one of our own do the solving once in a while, you know?" she squeezed his hand, excused herself, and happily walked off.

Shawn watched her go. "Y-you see that? He's even turned my own girlfriend against me."

Both Sam and Dean registered surprise at that. "Really? Girlfriend? When did that happen?" Dean asked Gus.

"Both too late and too soon if you ask me," Gus muttered.

"Anyway, we're not going to get anywhere if we just stand here," Dean said. "Shawn and I will shadow Lassiter and see if he does anything out of the ordinary. Sam, you and Gus go over the last nine cases that he solved and see if they have some connection or if anything jumps out. If he's getting some supernatural help we'll find it."

"Dean, normally I love it when you take charge," Shawn said, "But this is my turf and I believe I'm technically two years older than you, so I'm pulling rank here…"

"Shawn, forty-eight hours ago I was using a chainsaw to sever a vampire head from its body," Dean said. "What were you doing?"

Shawn coughed. "I was, uh, doing something equally manly… like chasing a bus filled with fleeing bad guys and hanging off the side of it using an umbrella, and then ultimately standing in front of the bus armed with nothing but a simple handgun…"

"Shawn, that's the opening scene from _Police Story_," Gus said to him.

"Fine, I defer leadership duties to Dean," Shawn said with a sigh.

As Shawn headed for the exit and Gus went to see if he could sweet talk the records officer into letting them see some files, Dean pulled Sam aside. "Remember what we discussed about dealing with civilians," he said.

"Dean, I'm not an idiot, I'll watch myself," Sam said impatiently, shaking his brother off and going after Gus.

Dean said a silent prayer to no one in particular that his brother would keep himself in check, and then followed an equally unpredictable Shawn in order to tail Lassiter.

Continued


End file.
